Best version of Mack the Knife is Ella Fitzgerald in Berlin. She forgets the lyrics halfway through and it's still awesome: "One of Fitzgerald's most acclaimed live performances, at this concert in Berlin, Fitzgerald successfully improvised the lyrics for the song, "Mack the Knife" after forgetting them. In recognition for this, she received the Best Female Vocal Performance (Single) and the Best Vocal Performance, Female (Album) at the 3rd Grammy Awards."

Ugh. I hate that Vegas-ized arrangement of Mac the Knife that Darin and all his imitators do. Listen to Marianne Faithful for more true to mood version.

I've heard a good version from Ute Lemper as well, but she must be getting sick of it, the recent YouTube versions of her singing feel kind of camped up.posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 12:45 PM on October 8, 2012 [2 favorites]

Diana Ross and the Supremes did an entire album of Rodgers and Hart — it was pretty good too. You can find a version of "Thou Swell" by them on youtube, but I'm at work so can't confirm if it's the version on the album.

The Beatles also covered "I Remember You," by Victor Schertzinger and Johnny Mercer. Though not strictly a show tune, it was from the soundtrack of the 1942 film The Fleet's In.posted by ubiquity at 12:53 PM on October 8, 2012

I can assure you, Grangrousier, that opposing fans still sing "You'll Never Work Again" every other Saturday at Anfield. It's actually quite a clever reworking of the song, which is why it causes so much strife. "Sign on, sign on, with your pen in your hand, because you'll never work again". Accompanied by the waving of handfuls of banknotes. Which is when the rows of police double-check their spacing very carefully and make sure everyone's on their toes. If it's Man United, it might be answered with a few bars of "Who's that lying on the runway, who's that dying in the snow?" (about the Munich air disaster of 1958), and then the United fans will start mocking the 96 who died at Hillsborough.

These people are all dickheads, but they're very EFFECTIVE dickheads.posted by Fnarf at 1:03 PM on October 8, 2012 [2 favorites]

I hate that Vegas-ized arrangement of Mac the Knife that Darin and all his imitators do.

That's part of what I love about the song - the disconnect between the creepy lyrics and the chipper, uptempo tune and delivery. Not that I don't like the darker versions too - and they get very dark indeed - but the irony is what gets me.posted by restless_nomad at 1:09 PM on October 8, 2012

Dammit, now I'm sitting @ work desperately trying to remember all of Forbidden Broadway's parody of her Back To Broadway album, including one set to "On a Clear Day." ("Back to Broadway to destroy more show tunes.") And I'm a Streisand fan/music theatre nerd, but it's hilarious.

I like the Beatle's cha-cha(?) version of 'Til There Was You." Even the Liverpudlian, "But I never sawrr them winging ..."posted by NorthernLite at 2:11 PM on October 8, 2012

CheeseDigestsAll: “Ugh. I hate that Vegas-ized arrangement of Mac the Knife that Darin and all his imitators do. Listen to Marianne Faithful for more true to mood version.”

Is that really true? The original version by Lotte Lenya, for whom the tune was actually written, is whirling, loud, fun, and happy. I think that's how it's supposed to be. The contrast, as restless_nomad said above, seems to be kind of the point. Now, however, there's a fad for dark, menacing things, and so people love to pour on the dark and menacing. I don't know that that's what Weill intended the song to sound like, however.

I do generally dislike Bobby Darin, though.

For what it's worth, you won't find it filed under "Mack the Knife," but my favorite recording of this song is Sonny Rollins',

nooneyouknow: “Best version of Mack the Knife is Ella Fitzgerald in Berlin. She forgets the lyrics halfway through and it's still awesome...”

Ella's 1960 rendition is here. It is very good, and deserves every accolade she received for it. However, I'll hasten to assert that I believe she did the song better six years later when she fronted the Duke Ellington live on the Cote d'Azur. In general, At The Cote D'Azur is one of the best records ever made anywhere by anybody, and I still regard it as Ella's peak, in large part because of this exceedingly good performance.

from post: “Elvis Costello, with My Funny Valentine (he also did a great version of Cole Porter's Let's Misbehave.)”

Yep – ol' Declan loves the old show tunes, just like his old man did. My favorite show-tune cover of his, however, is a Gershwin thing that you didn't list: "But Not For Me," with a nice harmonica cameo by the great Larry Adler.posted by koeselitz at 2:11 PM on October 8, 2012 [3 favorites]

Never really thought of Bobby Darin as (primarily) a Rock Guy per se. He kind of defies categories but he seems much more fluent and comfortable (to my ears) in the world of Broadway razzle-dazzle than the world of "Splish Splash." He idolized George Burns. He headlined Vegas casinos during the height of the Brat Pack era. He signed Wayne Newton and gave him "Danke Schoen," a song originally intended for him. His post-"Mack the Knife" songs were all pop or show tunes, until he got into his folky phase.posted by blucevalo at 2:12 PM on October 8, 2012

Yeah, Bobby Darin probably sits squarely in the "pop" category, with the certain diversity that indicates in his time period.

I've always liked that one. From another end of the universe, there's a gritty soul cover: Isaac Hayes did "Walk On By" too, and I like it better than anything else he did, I think. Including the backup singers. ("Walk-walk!")

But this doesn't strictly count as a rock cover of a show tune, does it? "Walk On By" was written as a pop song by Bacharach and Hal David, and originally sung by Dionne Warwick in 1963. Maybe it counts as a square pop tune redone as a good rock song.

I think it's almost impossible for rock singers not to mangle these songs. When done straight-faced, as with Rod Stewart and Bryan Ferry, they tend to be arch or shmaltzy, and in any case freakishly inappropriate; when done as ironic "takes" they just seem like childish burlesques. The only ones that can pull it off, I think, are artists, like McCartney or Elvis, that came out of a pre-rock tradition. The same is true of all the great R&B artists that did standards: Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, etc.

Is there a single exception to this? Somebody young that really got it? I'm thinking about it. None of the songs mentioned above. Elvis Costello probably does the most earnest versions. But he doesn't have the voice or the training to do the songs right. His wife does, but she's a jazz singer, and the standards are her natural repertoire.posted by Balok at 2:53 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

Well, you don't have to 'get it' to get something worthwhile. I give you the rather remarkable sights and sounds of Gary Numan in top cyborg mode doing On Broadway live in 1979. Notable for the 'mid-life Ultravox at their best' synth solo that plays the song out (for reasons well known to those who concern themselves with such things).

This was the first example of a "Screen Gems" publishing credit in my record collection, and may indeed be the last.posted by Devonian at 3:11 PM on October 8, 2012 [2 favorites]

My favorite inexplicable showtune cover is The Afghan Whigs doing Andrew Lloyd Webber's "The Temple" from Jesus Christ Superstar. It works a lot better than it should.posted by ausdemfenster at 3:32 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

A million years ago, I was in the Soviet Union on a college trip. One night, a crowd of us took off into Moscow without our Intourist guide and went to a bar for some drinks. One of our group got chatting with someone, and he either said we were American or his accent gave us away. It was a tiny tiny bar, and a little ripple went through the crowd. "Americans? Americans?" The ripple reached the band, who stopped what they were playing mid-song, and yelling something incomprehensible that might have been, "This is for the Americans!" launched into a heavily-accented rendition of Mack the Knife.

Balok: “I think it's almost impossible for rock singers not to mangle these songs. When done straight-faced, as with Rod Stewart and Bryan Ferry, they tend to be arch or shmaltzy, and in any case freakishly inappropriate; when done as ironic "takes" they just seem like childish burlesques. The only ones that can pull it off, I think, are artists, like McCartney or Elvis, that came out of a pre-rock tradition. The same is true of all the great R&B artists that did standards: Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, etc. Is there a single exception to this? Somebody young that really got it? I'm thinking about it. None of the songs mentioned above. Elvis Costello probably does the most earnest versions. But he doesn't have the voice or the training to do the songs right. His wife does, but she's a jazz singer, and the standards are her natural repertoire.”

Well – I am a jazz guy, not a rock guy, but I disagree.

See, when we jazz bugs got ahold of show tunes, they already were not ours; it was a long way from West 28th to 52nd Street. The original jazz tunes were folk songs of the South and of New Orleans, with popular American songs gradually coming into jazz over time. That happened mostly because of Louis Armstrong's incredibly influential work in the late 1920s and especially the early 1930s. In that time, there were one or two recordings made by jazz musicians which happened to be show tunes as well, but that was almost invariably because those performers starred in or wrote those shows themselves, and those all-black shows were generally seen as unique.

Historians tend to acknowledge Sidney Bechet's landmark 1938 recording of Gershwin's "Summertime" – a very big hit which established the then-struggling Blue Note records as a force in the industry – as the first proper jazz recording of a Broadway "standard." I seem to remember an unreleased Benny Goodman small group recording of "The Man I Love" from a little earlier (in fact from just after George Gershwin died the year before) but in general jazz covers of Broadway tunes were not common until the early to mid 1940s.

In short – jazz musicians started covering Broadway tunes not because they had any deep association with Broadway (although Broadway indeed looked on them with fondness and some kinship) but chiefly because jazz musicians tended to cover popular songs, and because Broadway songs happened to be very popular at the time.

So when jazz musicians play show tunes, we aren't doing it because the songs belong to us, or because they were intended as jazz songs; they weren't. I think we as jazz musicians cover show tunes because they were and are American songs – in the truest sense: these are the songs that make up the American songbook, and they ought to be seen as our birthright and have a place of pride in any musical tradition that springs up here. This is the proverbial Great American Songbook.

I guess what I'm getting at is – the songs that the Gershwins, Vernon Duke, Yip Harburg, Dorothy Fields, Hoagy Carmichael, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Lorenz Hart, and (yes) Kurt Weill wrote – they aren't great because of some intended arrangement, or some way they're supposed to sound. As a matter of taste I may prefer jazz arrangements of these songs, and they're certainly sweeter and make me happier, but honestly though they're both jazz renditions there is such a vast difference between this and this that I feel like they're further apart than a rock cover would be from either of them. These songs are meant to be reinterpreted over and over again in a billion different ways, and they earn their place in the canon by being so versatile.

So – rock bands should keep trying to cover Gershwin and Ellington. They should do it more often. This stuff belongs to everybody, and the more everybody hears it, the happier we'll all be, I believe.

(And, er, I have screwed up "I Got Rhythm" so many goddamned times that I really can't begrudge anybody for not nailing every note.)posted by koeselitz at 4:23 PM on October 8, 2012 [7 favorites]

Sinead O'Connor did a whole album of show tunes (and maybe some songs that are not literally show tunes, but that are famous songs that I ignorantly associate with the genre). I'm not a big fan of show tunes, and it's my least favorite Sinead O'Connor album as a result of that, but maybe some of you would enjoy it. Some songs from it:

Also, is Bobby Darin really a "rock guy covering show tunes"? I think he was more of a multigenrist (of more than just those two genres).posted by Flunkie at 4:26 PM on October 8, 2012

Is there a single exception to this?

I think my nomination of Dave Edmunds's "Where or When" qualifies; he's got the voice for it, and while his version isn't strictly in a "show tune" style, it is very definitely in a pre-Beatles pop-oldie style, which is what almost all of the other sung versions are too.

I also think that Mama Cass has the voice for these songs, and the stylistic understanding, and there's no way even the most fanatical show-tune aficionado could call what she does "mangling". She and Dionne Warwick, to my mind, had the best sixties pop voices (speaking only of pure pop, not soul or rock), amongst the women (oh, and Dusty too), but only Cass could reasonably be called "rock" as well. (Dionne was more jazz-inflected; no one skips through those complicated Bacharach rhythms like she did, though Lou Johnson came close.)posted by Fnarf at 4:34 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

So who's going to start the thread about going the other way -- the best pop-vocal or easy-listening versions of rock songs? I'll nominate Percy Faith's "Black Magic Woman" to start. Or how about the Hollyridge Strings doing "I Am The Walrus"? Hmm, maybe I'll go with The Lennon Sisters's spectacular rendition of "Green Tambourine".

Note: I am not being ironic, I genuinely love this kind of music and have hundreds of LPs of it.posted by Fnarf at 4:45 PM on October 8, 2012

(But somehow that's not really fair; the Doors always sound like easy listening already to me.)posted by koeselitz at 5:24 PM on October 8, 2012

Elvis Costello probably does the most earnest versions. But he doesn't have the voice or the training to do the songs right. His wife does, but she's a jazz singer, and the standards are her natural repertoire.

The right version is in the listener's mind.

Costello's version of 'My Funny Valentine' was right enough to help start get me interested in Show Tunes many years ago.

(Show Tunes were originally designed for live stage, with a sometimes um tricky dynamic between personality, acting, dancing, and vocal intonation, and everyone hopes for the best.)

Today TCM played an old Cole Porter movie with Cary Grant. Elvis Costello was in the more recent Cole Porter movie with Kevin Kline. The songs are good in both of them.

(I used to not like Diana Krall, I had thought that she was too bland. But if you listen close enough, she has some interesting subtleties at work in her music).posted by ovvl at 5:29 PM on October 8, 2012

ubiquity, several Motown acts did albums of show tunes, including Marvin Gaye, whose album Hello Broadway included then-popular songs like "People" and "Hello Dolly!" as well as "The Party's Over" (Comden, Green & Styne), "On the Street Where You Live" (Loewe & Lerner) and a bunch of others.

IIRC, the idea was to set up those acts to be able to play Vegas showrooms and similar venues. And in the case of Gaye, they thought he had a shot a being the "black Sinatra," which has proved be as elusive in its own way as "the next Dylan"....posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 5:51 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

That's part of what I love about the song - the disconnect between the creepy lyrics and the chipper, uptempo tune and delivery. Not that I don't like the darker versions too - and they get very dark indeed - but the irony is what gets me.

That can work for me to, but being chipper versus you think your making it "swing" is what doesn't work for me. Maxwell's Silver Hammer is chipper. Darin is trying to swing.

E Sting version might work if he had better phrasing, every line sounds the same.posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:53 PM on October 8, 2012

(seriously, though, this one might force me to find some recording equipment if we did it.)posted by Navelgazer at 7:44 PM on October 8, 2012 [2 favorites]

Wish I could find something of the Reivers doing "Lazy Afternoon." Or Lyle Lovett doing his version of "Mack the Knife." I did find Captain Sensible doing "Happy Talk" from South Pacific.posted by Man-Thing at 8:52 PM on October 8, 2012

luckynerd: “Devo also has a song called Somewhere with DEVO that includes the song "Somewhere" from The West Side Story. (YT Link , starts at 5:25)”

Yeah, I mentioned that above, but the sad live versions really don't do it justice at all. It must be experienced in its full, in-studio glory – thing is 20 minutes long. Seriously, it is awesome. And for some reason it's nowhere on the internet. It's on Recombo DNA, though.posted by koeselitz at 3:00 PM on October 9, 2012

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